Amir Avni's Progress

His first copy is not bad, but a little on the flat side. I gave him some tips and then suggested he do it again, this time fixing the mistakes.http://aapractice.blogspot.com/2007/10/pulling-my-hare.htmlHe compared it to the original to see how accurate he was. I also suggested that he write down what he is learning from each drawing he copies, so he can apply the general knowledge to his own drawings.http://aapractice.blogspot.com/2007/10/wellgulpnow-ive-seen-everything.htmlIf you are planning to be a cartoonist, you'd better get your suicide drawings down, because there is a huge call for this in our business. It's always good for a laugh. Almost as funny as stereotypes.After he copied some drawings, I told him to try to draw the characters in his own poses to see if he was learning anything from the copies. When you study something, it's not enough to merely copy. You should be trying to understand what you are copying so that you can apply it to your own work.http://aapractice.blogspot.com/2007/10/more-to-see.html

John said: "Seriously, I hope I am just reinforcing the basic traditional principles you are teaching. The more artists we get into the business that can draw for real, and not just imitating trendy flat stuff, the better chance us 2d folk have of surviving as an art form."

Have no fear, we're definitely on the same page, John. As my students can attest, I make them draw in a fully dimensional approach. Fortunately, I've been finding that most are quite receptive to it and are doing their best to meet that criteria in their work.

Aside to Kali: Hey, Kali, wouldn't it be great to have Porky Pig introduce Amid Amidi on stage? It would probably go something like this:

I've found that drawing a copied character in a couple of different poses after copying the character straight from another drawing is really important. Being able to copy a drawing from one sheet of paper to another is an entirely different skill than posing that character in your mind and getting THAT image on paper. I can almost feel a different part of my brain being used when I do this.

Also, drawing the character inverted after copying the drawing straight is what I'll normally do if I'm having trouble posing the character at first.

Doing this really helps to solidify the form of the character in my mind.

Hi John, its great that you're posting all this information, and that someone like Amir is following you're advice and improving. You have definitely encouraged me to keep drawing and to believe that there is still hope for GOOD QUALITY 2d animation... I just finished a course in 2d character animation at St Martins, London, UK. It was good but im trying to improve even more. I would like to study under you're guidance too, just like Amir.. where do I start?

What am I doing wrong? John, I have seriously read every single post from your blog's entire history and have tried to understand and apply the concepts to the best of my ability, yet I still fail at making my copies look like the screenshots. Like the screenshot with Bugs holding the book from Falling Hare. I've tried to copy that drawing nineteen times now, and even the most recent copy looks terrible.

I admire Amir Avni's progress, I just don't know what to do with myself.